Salvador Sobral

Salvador Sobral

Salvador Sobral is a Portuguese singer from Lisboa, born in 1989. He is associated with alternative rock, bossa nova, easy listening, jazz, jazz pop and pop, and he is also a former psychology student. He lives in Lisbon for most of his life and begins singing in bars while studying and living in Mallorca as an Erasmus student.

He is born Salvador Vilar Braamcamp Sobral into a former noble family, as the son of Salvador Luís Cabral Braamcamp Sobral, and he is related to politician Hermano José Braamcamp de Almeida Castelo Branco. He speaks Portuguese, Spanish, English and a little Italian.

Early appearances and studies

As a child, he appears on the television programme Bravo Bravíssimo at the age of ten. At 20, he is one of the ten finalists in Ídolos, the Portuguese version of the Idols franchise, where he performs songs by Stevie Wonder, Leonard Cohen and Rui Veloso. He studies psychology at the Instituto Superior de Psicologia Aplicada in Lisbon before leaving the programme.

He later applies to Taller de Músics in Barcelona and completes his studies there in 2014.

Career

In 2015, Sobral performs at the Vodafone Mexefest and EDP Cool Jazz festivals. He releases his first album, Excuse Me, in 2016. He is a fan of Chet Baker and of bossa nova singers including Caetano Veloso and Chico Buarque.

In 2017, he represents Portugal at the Eurovision Song Contest with “Amar Pelos Dois”, a song written by his sister, singer-songwriter Luísa Sobral. The song gives Portugal its first Eurovision win since the country’s debut in 1964. During the contest, he also draws attention to the European migrant crisis by wearing an “S.O.S. Refugees” shirt and using his public profile to support refugees crossing Europe.